Month: January 2019

Jen Hoffman, is an amazing political activist whose efforts for the past two years have stoked the Resistance with hundreds of ways to thwart Trump’s agenda.  She continues to labor on behalf of those who want to take specific action as citizens to support democracy. These people believe that Trump’s rhetoric and decisions pose unprecedented  threats to the stability of the government and to the security of the American people. Hoffman strives to show these people  what they can do to stay politically active…
Hoffman has produced an Americans of Conscience  checklist which is rich with opportunities to become active in the Resistance movement.  The list will inspire users with concrete steps and elicit a sense of gratefulness for what  others already are doing to support the victims of Trump’s decisions.
Hoffman’s checklist is designed for action and to express gratitude. One of the first items on the checklist, to help ones neighbor, we addressed two days ago. Knowing that the Chippewa Tribe in Sault Ste. Marie was advancing toward disruption in the operation of their health clinics due to the shutdown, we recommended calling our two Senators Stabenow and Peters, to make sure they knew about tL this impending crisis. If you haven’t gotten in touch with them yet,, please call their offices Monday or leave a message today.
Here are some other things you might consider doing with the checklist:  Sign up to get the checklist on a weekly basis.  Specifically check out the Good News section to lift your spirits and maybe make a commitment to get involved. Write a thank you note, or call the person/s you think deserve to know how appreciative you are of their work. Forward this Americans of Conscience checklist to others who you think would benefit knowing about these activities or post on your Facebook page. 
Let me know about a specific link you followed up on, found intriguing and think deserves more coverage.. (There are too many links for just one person to peruse all of them.)  For example I checked on the Michigan Nurses Association valuable work to eliminate $9.8 million in medical bills for 9,200 people. Letters will go out next week informing northern Michigan  recipients that their medical debts have been canceled.  How wonderful!
Let yourself be filled up with all of this good news of people helping others. As you know, the pathway to contentment is paved with altruism.
https://americansofconscience.com/1-6-2019/

The fact that the Dems now have legitimate Congressional power and have hit the ground running makes the Trump shutdown only slightly easier to bear. The shutdown grinds on in an almost carnival -like atmosphere with the President tossing out words like “months” or “years” re the length of the shutdown like crumbs to the pigeons. He impulsively loves to ratchet up the fear factor as a tactical ploy. Of course the ones he truly terrorized with these last comments  were those people caught in the shutdown’s cross hairs.
It has become an accepted fact that this caricature of a President lacks all empathy. The only mention he has made of the people involved in the shutdown was as props supporting his decision.. He claimed yesterday that most of the federal workers furloughed or sent home  supported the shutdown. Of course there has been no polling of these workers, so per usual common sense makes it easy to dismiss his statement as pure poppycock.. What worker  with a mortgage  payment due and no money coming in would continue to wave his MAGA cap with overdue penalties piling up?
Along with federal workers, let’s not forget the 1.9 million Native Americans who likewise are now having their health care and food distribution networks disrupted. Given the human suffering involved, the fact that the Congressional GOP continues to go along, like little lambs, with Trump makes them accomplices to his dirty deeds..
 Only two GOP Senators have broken from the ranks. Cory Gardner, up for re-election in 2020 in Colorado, will have no chance of winning if he sticks with Trump’s shutdown. So he gets no points for empathy. Susan Collins, also running  again in 2020. continues her dithering ways, testing the wind to see how she should position herself. She .gets no credit either. Either one recognizes the stupefying irrationality of Trump’s blackmail efforts  or one falls into the self interested, submissive camp.
This terrific article in The Guardian today puts examples of real people into the immigration story. Writer Art Cullen discusses how the immigrants in these small communities tackle the jobs no else will take and help to buoy these town which would otherwise crumble. He believes that it is these stories that fundamentally will change the narrative and make the country a welcoming place for immigrants once again.. For now he predicts that it will be “liberty and humanity versus fear and intolerance”.
We are up for the fight….enjoy the article.    
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jan/05/trump-immigration-iowa-lose-bigly

The media seems to be doing a good job of keeping the public abreast of the government shutdown drama in Washington. Strategizing by Pelosi, Schumer  is getting good coverage as is Trump’s stone faced non- strategy.. But out in the hinterlands, where the impact of this shutdown is taking a toll, coverage has been skimpy at best. Here from the New York Times is an article explaining how the Trump shutdown has already become onerous for Native American tribes and promises to get much worse if the shutdown persists
 Because a  majority of the  staff at the Bureau of Indian Affairs have been furloughed, regular department services  have been either scaled back or shutdown completely.This curtailment of programs means that the federal funds intended for tribes now are not being  distributed.. Reverberations from lack of funding have impacted tribes all around the country.
 In northern Michigan, a tribe of Chippewa Indians in the Upper Peninsula faces significant cutbacks to tribal health care services. In the southwest, food programs now face the likelihood of being shut down, raising the real threat of hunger lin the middle of winter for the Navajo Nation. Tribes in Wisconsin, Minnesota and Oklahoma report significant problems in the delivery of food and health care services.
The partial shutdown of the federal government was supposed to focus on non-essential government services. What was the criteria for funding certain programs and not others?  Why  was the Bureau of Indian Affairs included in the non-essential category?  The Bureau funds basic  health and food programs for 1.9 million Native Americans in this country. It certainly should have been deemed an essential service. . So put this Trump fiasco down as causing more broken promises to the Native American tribes. Trump’ hubris and desperate pandering to his base is creating real suffering  which  sadly is going pretty much unnoticed by most people.. The media needs to do a better job of letting all Americans know that the human costs of this shutdown are real and substantive. They also need to keep hammering home the point that Trump, goaded on by talk radio, is blackmailing Congress simply not to lose face with his base. What a despicable human being he is.
Let’s call our Dem Senators today, Peters and Stabenow, and make sure that they are aware of the breakdown in services to the Chippewa Indian tribe in Sault St. Marie. Explain that it is their job to see that if necessary, emergency funds (either federal or state) need to be directed to the tribe if the shutdown continues. It is their job to do whatever it takes to see that this tribe receives help, They should be in contact with Gov. Whitmer as well. Their numbers are below.  https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/01/us/native-american-government-shutdown.html

Today, Nancy Pelosi takes her place as one of the most outstanding Speakers in our country’s history. Her ascendancy to the Speakership for the second time shows her uncanny leadership skills and resilience in the face of significant challenges from the Republicans and some of  her own House members. 
For the last two years, Trump has labored to make her name a rallying cry of derision. Trump connected the  name Pelosi to all of the base’s resentments toward the old guard establishment in Washington in general and the Obama Administration in particular. Her name became a tool for goading the crowds to boo and hiss and imagine Pelosi somehow as the mastermind of all their perceived grievances. Trump’s misogyny got sprinkled into this narrative against Pelosi as well. To think that another woman besides Hillary had reached the pinnacle of government power has been more than the Trump supporters could stomach.  
In addition, Pelosi had to manage an uprising on her own side of the aisle. Discontent with her leadership had percolated among some of the Dem caucus members in recent years and came to a boil when the time came to elect a Speaker after the November Mid-Terms. A group of rogue House members actively tried to push for new leadership and some of the winning Dem newcomers joined their group. Pelosi handled the rebellion with mastery, using all of her tools and experience to quell the uprising.   
Nancy Pelosi is a survivor and a master politician. It is difficult to overstate her impressive performance over the years. She crashed through that imposing glass ceiling as a standout political leader amidst a group of ambitious, ego-driven House members – the majority of whom have been men.  Just imagine the number of egos and power plays she has had to manage and overcome over the years.
 Hopefully, in her autobiography (a presumption on my part that she will write one), she will reveal all of her secrets, so they can be bottled and distributed to women seeking positions of power in Congress. But today, let’s give her a rousing cheer for making history. Women and men alike can celebrate her outstanding record of public service and contributions to our democracy.
Enjoy this excellent article in Politico giving Pelosi her due.
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/01/03/nancy-pelosi-speaker-congress-profile-1077678

It makes sense to celebrate a great idea when one shows up and this one, in particular, certainly qualifies as a great idea.  According to this article by Kevin Drum in Mother Jones, the new Governor of California, Gavin Newsome, is floating a legislative initiative to fund a pre-k year and full day kindergarten for children attending California public schools. Now that sounds like a downright important idea.
For decades, the constant refrain from education scholars has been that the best way for a child to excel academically in elementary and high school is to be adequately prepared for kindergarten. To be prepared requires informed parenting and  emphasizing language development and literacy during the toddler years..
 Unfortunately, many young parents, especially those  dealing with issues of poverty do not have the knowledge or experience from their own childhood to engage in smart parenting.  They do not understand the importance of providing rich reading and numbers activities for their children to enhance their school readiness. As  a result, many poor students show up on the first day of kindergarten already behind.. And if they haven’t caught up with their age peers by third grade, subsequent remediation will not be able fill all of their cognitive gaps. 
That is why early childhood education looms as one of the biggest challenges most states need to consider.  California will be showcasing this state wide program and if it succeeds, can become a framework for other states to follow.  
It has been argued that a every state has one of two budgetary choices: They can spend money to educate children up front in pre-k classes and full day kindergarten. Or they can spend the money on the back end with  full scale juvenile detention centers and exorbitant prison system costs.
And here is the best news of all.  Incoming Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer plans to make early childhood education a budget priority. She intends to “focus on the first 1,000 days of a child’s life’ and “get  Michigan on a path to universal preschool to ensure that when kids enter kindergarten, they are ready to learn.”  
To accomplish these goals, Whitmer and those on the left will need to make it clear to the Michigan Legislature that this plan makes perfect economic sense. Paying for kids’ early education saves millions of tax dollars currently going for incarceration costs. After eight years of a GOP Administration in which Michigan student performance has hit rock bottom, this idea is one Michigan citizens should readily embrace.. Let’s plan to pay close attention to Whitmer’s budget plans and jump in with support when she starts extolling early childhood education.
Enjoy the article.
https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2019/01/california-governor-elect-kicks-off-2019-with-early-childhood-spending-proposal/